


Haunted by your Memory

by send_tudes



Series: Oneshots [4]
Category: 16th Century CE RPF, Elizabeth R - Fandom, The Tudors (TV)
Genre: Gen, More angst, definitely not this, elizabeth has a dream sequence of sorts, elizabeth just wants to rest, henry is a prick, the privy council is not having a good time, this is set circa post ridolfi plot, what is good writing, what is natural dialogue, what is work flow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:08:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25218262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/send_tudes/pseuds/send_tudes
Summary: While she endures a particularly annoying council meeting, Elizabeth has a conversation with her father.
Relationships: Anne Boleyn & Elizabeth I of England, Elizabeth I of England & Henry VIII of England, also her siblings, her privy council and rob dudely, mentions of elizabeth's relationships with k howard
Series: Oneshots [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1831741
Kudos: 24





	Haunted by your Memory

“But it is most necessary!”

“We know that, my lord! The only matter in question is…”

Faint murmurs. Agitated hissing. Trembling footsteps.

Why couldn’t they just get out?

She wanted to rest. Her hands still ached. When was it that she had written that letter? This morning mayhaps? Or was it last week? It felt much more closer, certainly. 

The queen shook her head. She was losing her grip. She needed to get her head together. 

Her head.

Her skin tightened on her knuckles as her privy council argued and argued. Every effort couldn’t bring her to clear her head. Was it one of those times? When she had collapsed in front of the palace doors, drenched in cold sweat, body swaying, feeling that she would die the next second? It felt much less turbulent this time, did it not?

“ _ Elizabeth.” _

Her head stiffened in an instant. She had not heard that voice for years. And she never hoped to heat it again. In that moment, the room was silent save her own heartbeat. There was no one there but the two monarchs. 

“How dare you, you insolent child!’ Henry of blessed memory, or cursed, as she liked to think of him, boomed, magnificent even in death.

And for the first time since she was a child of two, Elizabeth looked him in the eyes.

“By your grace,  _ dearest  _ father,” her lips were pursed as they often were in one of her cold furies, “you cannot mock me.”

“You destroyed what we had built…”

“Destroyed? We think otherwise, father.”

“You dare speak back to us?”

“Yes, I dare, father.” she trembled still, but concealing it was a gift, “You cannot banish or execute me now. You are but a pile of bones and mud, and I-I am the queen!”

“You are a feeble and foolish woman!” he said coldly. “You are weak! You would not kill the Scot, even as she is your prisoner. She shall kill you, child, and you would have done all to deserve it.”

Elizabeth laughed. It was a dry laugh, devoid of any humor.

“Was the countess of Salisbury out to kill you, father? Was Katherine of Aragon plotting? Did my mother plot?”

“That whore-”

“The only whore, father, is you.”

Henry looked taken aback. Elizabeth breathed slowly, to release the fury that had suddenly overcome her.

“Would I wish to god,” she said stiffly, “that you had stayed with Katherine. That you would never have turned your eye to my mother. And I would not be here. Instead Mary would be, happy, unaffected by how you betrayed my poor sister and her mother. And  _ I,  _ I would be free of this burden that you threw upon me.”

“You should be grateful that I let you live!”

“Should I, father? You never loved me. I knew, just as the last breath left your body, that the only object of your affections was no one but yourself.”

“I do not spare love for traitors!” 

“And how indeed, had a child of three committed so great a crime that you would not spare clothes for her? You killed the only people who loved me, and you left me to be destroyed.”

“And so I would have it, had I known what you would become!”   
  


Elizabeth looked at her father, furious as she remembered him, but set back. In his life, she would not have dared to say one word her father might disapprove of. She calculated each syllable, reflected on each sentence, thinking of only his approval. Yet here she was, berating him in death.

“You are jealous, father,” she chuckled viciously. “You failed to be the great monarch you wanted, failed in making your son a great monarch, but I, I, the discarded bastard, surpassed you in all things. Except of course,” she paused, savoring the sour look on Henry's face, “murdering wives.”

There was a rather long pause and Elizabeth closed her eyes.

“They said that you had chosen another title for me, father. I knew better, of course. Why, only a week prior to it, I had read about my grandmother, whom Richard of Gloucester had made a bastard, and was thereafter known as the Lady Elizabeth. Did you think that I would not know? Well, you cared nothing for me, that I know.”

“You speak nonsense! Whatever you will you must do, for you are god’s anointed monarch, unfit and heretical as you are, but if you would, heed your father!”

“What do you want? Have you not caused enough damage? Now you require me to listen?”

“I desire only the glory of our dynasty. I would not fail my father again.”

“You have failed him thoroughly already, what else is there to be done?”

Henry stayed quiet. Elizabeth looked away, at the table, enjoying his frustration. 

“I ask for two things.”

“To kill everyone I distrust and leave the running of the country to my council, I assume?”

“Kill the Scot.”

“Ah, but of course.”

“You know it is urgent!”

“I would not kill on mere suspicion, and anyway, do you really think that I should heed you? The man who killed my mother and left me to die?”

“You go too far!”

She laughed. It was a hearty laugh, but without any heart in it. 

“I could say the same of you, father. What else do you want me to do?”

“Find a husband.”

“Tsk, tsk. And what, do I kill him if he fails to give me a male heir?”

“You make light of our peril.”

“If god intends our dynasty to end with me, so be it. You should be thankful it did not end with you!”

“If you do not kill those who stand in your way, you will lose.”

“I am not you, father, I never will be so help me god.”

“Elizabeth,” his voice softened, “you are my daughter and-”

“Am I? You seemed to think it was Henry Norris?”

“Enough!” Henry roared and Elizabeth’s hands shook, but she remained firm. “You know it well! From the day you were born it was said again and again that you were my image. You may try to be a merciful ruler, such as your womanly instinct dictates, but your hands will see blood. Either that, or your neck!”

“I am not like you, father,” she repeated, “I may have had the misfortune to be born to you but I am Elizabeth. I am not cruel and unjust, nor will I be!”

Henry ignored this slight.

“Robert Dudley,” he said quietly, “he is your friend, is he not? You treat him with favour, yet you would not hesitate to send him to the block if he defects?”

“Was Thomas More a traitor? Is any man a traitor for following his conscience, father?”

“You treat him with contempt, you threaten to take off his head-”

“But unlike you, I do not put that into practice. As for the rest, you did this to me, father. You made Mary into a grieving fanatic, Edward into a heartless tyrant, and me into a bitter old woman who would die to conceal it.”

“It is in your nature.”

“Is it? Do not try and convince me that we are the same! I was a gentle girl, sweet, kind to my friends, intelligent, pleasant, but from the moment you sent my poor cousin to the block everything I did was an act!”

Her voice broke and she coughed, determined not to let her father see her guard down.

“I will be better than you, you shall see. Go, you haunt my sleep frequently enough, I do not need to see you more often. Go and think on what I have said, father.”

Elizabeth turned to look at her father, sighing in relief that his giant figure had vanished. There was a stench of foul air from where he had stood, but he was gone. Finally.

Elizabeth laid her face against the cool surface of the table, breathing slowly.

The gentle caresses of a faint hand did not make her flinch as any unexpected touch always did.

“It is late, sweetheart. Off to bed, you are tired.”

“No, mother,” she murmured, “they must be satisfied.”

“Bessie, you need to rest. Will you not listen to your mother?”

“Your Majesty?”

In an instant she got up.

“Your Majesty? You have not spoken for a while?”

It was Cecil who was talking to her. She took a moment to register her surroundings. Her privy council was anxiously looking at her, no doubt just having bickered.

Elizabeth reached for her nape and pressed into it, trying to reach out for the remnants of the touch that may or may not have been there moments ago. 

“We are tired and we shall retire for the night. My lord, you will call the council tomorrow. Until then, sirs and lords, good night.”

“Good night, your majesty,” they said in unison as she left.

No, she was not her father, however much she looked like him. She was Elizabeth Tudor, and that she would always be. 

.

**Author's Note:**

> Fck off Henrat! Also I'll update my wotr fic soon I'm just stuck on a point.


End file.
